Posted
by
CmdrTacoon Monday July 27, 2009 @11:00AM
from the or-are-you-just-less-picky dept.

FelxH writes "Scientists have found that evolution is driving women to become ever more beautiful, while men remain as aesthetically unappealing as their caveman ancestors.
The researchers have found beautiful women have more children than their plainer counterparts and that a higher proportion of those children are female. Those daughters, once adult, also tend to be attractive and so repeat the pattern." I just thought my
standards were changing as I got older, but it turns out it's just science!

They'd have seen Jessica Simpson as a freakishly stretched elf - on the verge of starvation.

I wish I had a mod point for you.

We're talking about a lot of different cultures in lots of different times, I'm sure not many of the average men from each instance would find today's average American woman (The data used was gathered in the US) much more attractive. And of course, if the qualitative assessment of how beautiful a woman is is based on how many babies they make, I'm not sure if they could really agree anyways; I could call a girl a perfect ten, even if she turns out to be barren.

I do find it odd, however, that the article states that today's men are supposedly as aesthetically pleasing as cavemen. This doesn't really fit with the argument they make in saying attractiveness tends to be hereditary. Smells a little too much like bullshit on the. Either that, or the scope of the study is too narrow. I'm failing at looking up any other real information about this study.

Generally speaking, men aren't selected on the basis of physical attractiveness. Women are generally selected based on replication value and have very little survival value. By contrast, men are generally selected based on survival value but have very little replication value.

That's not true, and it's another flaw in the design of the study. In brief, you can *always* account for a woman's offspring - after all, she's pregnant for 9 months and gives birth rather conspicuously. It is therefore pretty much impossible for a woman to hide one of her offspring. If she has a child, we know about it.

Men on the other hand can easily have offspring that no one knows about. In other words, this whole study is predicated on the spectacularly naive assumption that all children are the offspring of their legal fathers, which is known to be false. A small, but significant percentage of all children born are were fathered by someone other than their mother's husband. This means that *attractive* men really *do* have more children. It's just that they often have them by cuckolding other men.

This means that both attractive men and attractive women have more offspring.

I am with you. The two most beautiful women I have ever seen each weighed about 250Lbs. They were both also quite tall (5'10") and lucky me, I dated both of them. I don't notice those skinny little stick figure women anymore.

That it is the curvature which men find most attractive, the 0.7 index - women a hundred years ago were heavier, but the attractive ones still had the "right" aspect between hips and waist (ie, that which makes for best reproduction)

Personally, I see the exact opposite happening. I find the obsession today with straight, unfeminine, twig like bodies down right freakish and creepy. Today it seems like if a woman has nice curves, she is labeled as "fat". The concept of what makes a woman "fat" has become so blown out of reality that I can only assume that we have an entire nation that's slowly turning gay (not that there's anything wrong with that) as we prefer images of women that are more and more boyish.

What is attractive in a culture is usually tied to what is possible for high-status people to achieve.

As obesity dominates the lower-classes, thinner body types will continue to define beauty. Working- and lower-class people in the US have diets dominated by heavy starches, red meat, high fructose corn syrup, and heavy food additives. The middle and upper classes, especially on the coasts, have diets dominated by fresh vegetables and seafood, and usually can afford the time and energy to go to the gym, etc. As long as body-types line up along class lines in that fashion, thin (and fit) will be in.

Similarly, before the industrial revolution it was unfashionable to be tan, since being tan meant that you were working out in the fields. After the industrial revolution, it became fashionable to be tan, because that meant that you weren't in a factory all day.

Not really. The average marrying age for girls used to be 13-20. If you made it past then, you were either on your second marriage already or were desperately trying to find a husband.

Today's standards of beauty follow the same premise. The difference is, women are getting married later in life -- due to how much preparation is given before they are considered adults -- and thus, desire to be unnaturally skinny in order to resemble young girls in the 13-20 range.

Biologically, this makes sense. Human males are attracted to just post-pubescent girls as that is their most fertile time. I'd say that it isn't so much the standards of beauty that are changing, but rather social views of when a woman can be viewed as sexually attractive.

If you mention to someone in the 1920's that one can get arrested for photoshoping a pic of Miley Cyrus (16 years old), they'd look at you funny.

I discussed this with my wife the other day, after she'd been watching the Fashion Channel. The audience for catwalk fashion shows is buyers (mostly commercial) of clothing, and that audience is dominated by thin women and gay men. Whatever the models on the catwalk look like, it doesn't tell you anything about contemporary tastes of heterosexual men.

Which is why I so often chose the beach for 1st dates during my dating years and took soda and fruit juice to those encounters rather than alcohol of any kind.

If you soak her in warm salt water and scorch her in 100 degree heat for for a few hours and she still looks good in a bikini standing under the noonday sun you know that at the very least, she either looks good naturally or has modifications of some permanence.

That's not my true in my case. When I was a teenager I thought a woman was beautiful all the way upto 40 (think classmates' attractive moms)

Nowadays I often think 30 is the cutoff point...sometimes even as young as 25 if she lets herself get fat... from "cute" to "porky" in just a few years. For example I might look at Britney Spears and think, 'She used to be hot, but now she has jumbo thighs and a beer belly." Ditto Ashley Simpson or that Ghostwhisper girl. I often find myself thinking younger is better.

I blame the internet. Whereas I used to think "girl == hot" and I really didn't care if she had saggy breasts just as long as she had some, now exposure to literally millions of photographs has made me prefer small, firm breasts. i.e. I'm more picky and shallow.

I don't know - some of the 1930s ladies were pretty hot. I recall watching one scene where two girls are living together, and suddenly they strip-down to their undides. That made me sit-up and take notice.

And of course there's that infamous Tarzan scene where Janes swims naked. She looks quite nice as well.

Female executives with no concept of work/life balance (living with cats) still get paid less than their male peers. Same thing for brown people, short people, and all sorts of minorities in the US (I am a tall white male that gets paid way more than my peers). The only way any of this will ever change is if companies start publishing payroll data publicly, or at least to their employees. Companies take advantage of the strange social stigma that it's somehow inappropriate to talk about salary with peers, and they use that to underpay as many of their employees as they can get away with.

And does anyone actually follow this? I tell my coworkers freely if they ask. If either of us are being fucked, we want to know. If they threatened termination based on that, they'd find themselves on the losing side of that exchange, as being a somewhat popular employee being fired for such a bullshit reason would be a morale killer- not to mention I would refuse to do any handoff effort on my work costing them man months.

Female executives with no concept of work/life balance (living with cats) still get paid less than their male peers.

They make like 97 cents for every dollar that an equally qualified man makes. No, that's clearly not total parity but things are far closer than the whiners would have us believe.

Same thing for brown people, short people, and all sorts of minorities in the US (I am a tall white male that gets paid way more than my peers).

I'm a tall minority male. In every job I have ever held, I have made as much as if not more than my peers because I'm good at what I do and I know how much my work is worth.

Companies take advantage of the strange social stigma that it's somehow inappropriate to talk about salary with peers, and they use that to underpay as many of their employees as they can get away with.

Have you ever considered this... Companies will pay any employee as little as possible. Employees who know the value of their work and are willing to leave if they are not properly compensated are more likely to get paid what they're worth. Due to other societal factors, white men tend to be more bold or brazen in their desire to demand higher compensation so they are the ones who get it.

I've been on interviews where they ask me for my requirements and I'm open and firm about what I need to make. Sometimes they come back with "Well, this position only pays $X", this isn't really to inform you. It's to test you. It's to find out if you will work for less. Stick to your guns. Be police, but firm that you need to make your figure. If you're the best candidate for the job, they'll hire you and pay you what you're worth.

This isn't always the case during an economic downturn, but if you groom your expectations to match the current state of the job market you can still make it work for you.

Well maybe the US is different in this regard (but I do doubt that) however Statistics Canada said years ago that when you account for education, experience, hours worked etc. then there was no statistically significant difference between the pay of men and women. Not that this has in any way stopped propaganda statements like "Women only earn $0.65 on the dollar compared to men!!!!!" continuing to be spread. And to anyone who cries "Citation?" you've got fingers, look it up.

Also a woman is seens as a risk. Yes, I know it's sexist and no employer will ever admit it because he could be dragged to court for it, but there is the "risk" that she will get pregnant and go on maternity leave. Depending on the country you're in, that could well mean not only that you are going to miss an experienced worker but also that she may even be entitled to getting her job back after being away 2-3 years. That in turn means that you would have to hire someone new, train him, then fire him after 2-3 years when he finally reached productivity level, only to rehire someone who has been out of the loop for 2-3 years and maybe has to be retrained.

See why many companies refuse to hire women for any job but the ones that require the least training? And thus also usually have the lowest pay?

>>>Women's average earnings will stay lower than men's average earnings

This is called lying with statistics. When you compare like-to-like, such as a female programmer with 20 years experience versus a male programmer with 20 years experience, you find the woman actually gets paid a few percent more. Given equal jobs with equal experience both sexes are treated basically equal.

The reason why the *overall* average shows women getting less is because there are simply fewer women willing to do high-paid jobs like programming, or dangerous high-pay jobs like living on an oil rig.

Well I don't know where you live but in the part of Canada I live in teachers are very well paid. They start at about $45K and move up quickly and that's for working less than 10 months of the year. And, I have to say this, at the universities I attended the education students weren't considered the brightest lights.

Interesting. I think we might have a differing opinion on what very well paid means.

My roommate in college quit his software engineering job to become a teacher in Anaheim a few years back. He

Well I guess well paid depends on the cost of living where you are and what other people make. The average family income here is about $60K/yr so starting fresh out of school at $45K (with all the nice bennies you mentioned) for 10 months work seems like it is well paid to me. Especially compared to a new Ph.D. gets in say chemistry.

The wage gap opens when you lump people together into groups. "Programmer" is everything from someone who can slap together more-or-less stable php code for some low-load, low-security webpage to someone who can develop ring0 drivers. Supply and demand dictate that these people don't earn the same. The same applies to other trades.

I don't know what trade you are in, but I'm fairly sure you can think of different companies that are in your area of trade that may have different, maybe higher or lower, require

Flamebait? This should be marked +5 informative. The parent is grossly stereotyping. I don't evaluate women in 1/2 a second, but I'll admit that in 1/2 a second I have some evaluation. There's a big difference. Sure physical appearances might be important since they are what's noticed at first. But this doesn't cover all cases. I've met many physically attractive women whom after having opened their mouths looked like a bag of batshit to me. So even if we do sometimes "think with our dicks", it's not the on

If more attractive parents have more daughters and if physical attractiveness is heritable, it logically follows that women over many generations gradually become more physically attractive on average than men.

Except that the standard for "beauty" changes over time. I'm not sure I'm buying this.

Except that the standard for "beauty" changes over time. I'm not sure I'm buying this

not really. In magazines they change, but the real beauty does not. There are basic qualities that have withstood the test of time. Also there have been MANY studies using the baby smile test. You take babies ranging from 3 months to 1 year old. These kids are too young to have been influenced by what the media/general public considers to be attractive (e.g. magazine influence). You show them pictures of people of one attractive person and one unattractive person. The babies will gaze and smile towards what they find attractive, and ignore what they don't find attractive. So put up a picture of Rosie O'donnal vs Scarlett Johanson and Rosie won't get more then a glance from the baby. They have found, over the years and even regions, babies find similar things to be attractive. A few of the features I remember
Symmetry (e.g. Chunk from the goonies is not symmetrical)
Smooth/similar colored skin (not black vs white, but your skin color is even colored. If you have a melanoma condition you are screwed)
Developed hips (for women) which helps in child birthing
Healthy weight (anorexia is not healthy, but neither is a person who is 10 lbs overweight)
Developed/Square jaw (for men)
Good muscles for men (yes your abs are important) - it shows you can physically protect and hunt for your mate
Good teeth (shows you get things like vitamin C)
Developed breasts (for women duh)
Smell (yes being clean is a physically attractive trait)

This test has been done over and over since at least the 60's (if not before). It always has the same results (meaning its verifiable and reliable).

What has been considered attractive, for the most part, has been the same over time.

This seems like the guppy phenomenon. Under a lack of predation the guppies self select to breed for beauty. Under heavy predation they breed to survive and quickly become plain. We are the guppies. We have no predators. It just takes longer to show up with us because our life cycle takes longer.

There are only two physical traits with universal sexual appeal cross-culturally, symmetry you mentioned and clear skin. All of these ratios and such are measuring the current cultural zeitgeist with regards to beauty, and those standards are largely culturally plastic. Little better in methodology than phrenology.

Those pristine museum pieces belonged to teenagers and various noblemen who never fought anything stronger than a cold, and pranced in the back of the battlefield wearing armour instead of charging at the front.The ones used by big burly zweihander wielding men mostly ended up rusting in some field somewhere in the end.Knights died in their armours or if they've managed to retire - were buried in them.Those things had cost back then as much as a car would today - only they were "tailor-fitted" for each individual. Spares were an option only for VERY rich.

Also... one word... arquebus.Nobles that trained since their teens to be knights and later charged at lines of peasants who got handed their arquebuses to them whole two weeks earlier - haven't made it home so their armour could be preserved for posterity.

It's just selection making sure that desirable traits get passed. Just like bloodhounds were selected for their ability to sniff out game, their descendants grew to have the most reliable nose of all breeds. Similarly, if intelligence was the greatest traits looked for in a mate, our race would become smarter with each passing generation... and suddenly this explains a lot, doesn't it?

I know I'll get modded troll or flamebait for pointing this out, but there is a very definite tendency for looks and smarts to go together. Despite stereotypes and Hollywood scripts to the contrary, good looks get one a better selection of dates and have a much better shot at not having to compromise. Hence the suggestion that's been made that we'll probably end up with a fork eventually between the good looking geniuses and everybody else. Admittedly that's highly theoretical and could definitely turn out

Evolutionarily, you'd expect that a species would gravitate towards more attractive members due to the increased ability of those members to reproduce. But consider that the likelihood of an ugly set of people to actually reproduce is much higher than a set of very attractive people to do so.

Humans are an interesting species. We are able to actually avoid evolution. In several tens of generations, humans will likely be all near-sighted due to our glasses and Lasik technology. Likewise, very attractive people know they have an increased likelihood of mating. This mating, for many of them, is a recreational activity instead of a procreative activity. So the use of prophylactics among attractive people actually prevents evolution from taking its course.

So why do we seem to have teenage girls blossoming so early? I'd wager that it is the use of hormones in cows that has artificially accelerated the aging process among humans. Since it is very easy to determine accelerated physiological changes in girls (larger breasts, wider hips, etc) than in boys (facial and body hair, etc), the incorrect assumption may be made that only girls are being affected. However, the use of hormones in our food affects all who ingest it.

Menses is largely dependant on having sufficient calories, both intake and stored(approaching 20% bodyfat), and estrogen. Fat also emits estrogen, so fat kids means earlier menarche.

Compare a gymnast (high caloric output, minimal caloric input relative to output) to a girl who's economic status is such that she gets sufficient calories in the form of fast food & microwave meals and spends 15+ hours per day sitting on her ass.

On the other hand, the average age of menarche has only changed by maybe 3 or 4 months in the last 30 years.

The researchers have found beautiful women have more children than their plainer counterparts and that a higher proportion of those children are female. Those daughters, once adult, also tend to be attractive and so repeat the pattern.

If anything the reasons a woman has a baby has nothing to do with her looks and everything to do with her sense of well being, security along with cultural beliefs. Women are plenty attractive enough to get some sort of a sex partner and I'm trying to identify a time when that has not been the case.

In today's day and age, culture matters for birth more than looks. There are some women out there having nearly 10 children simply because they feel it is a christian thing to do. How does evolution account for that, unless it accounts for obvious social influences. On the opposite end of the scale, you have some green women who are deeply concerned that bringing too many children into the world might somehow compromise the planet.

It's almost like environment plus culture need to be considered as a holistic system in order to really understand human evolution.

The article does not mention the participants having cosmetic surgery. If the surgery was something like breast augmentation or the like, then the genes for "ugliness" would be carried forward. I would call it genetic false advertising. This would progress into the further generations becoming dependent upon surgery to be beautiful. That is until the definition of being beautiful changes, perhaps being polydactyl will be the rage in 2100.

Huh. I had no idea that watching my wife grow in beauty over 15 years was watching evolution in process. Nice.

This discovery has lead to the solution to a particular slashdot meme.

a. Yes, this post is sappy and sentimental.

b. Yes, I am sending my wife a link to this post.

c. Yes, the kids are going to bed early tonight.

d. Profit!!!

LOL, congratulations, your just figured out the true purpose of this "study". Scientifically proving the female you like is the most beautiful woman ever scores some major points. At least that is what I was thinking the whole time I read the summary.

Since I don't, I'll do the next most popular thing on/. and point out your error. Silicone, which used to be used for fake boobies, has a specific gravity just above that of water (1.1 range). Silicon, which powers your computer, has a specific gravity of 2.3.

Again, this/. so I can see how things got mixed up. AFAICT, the latter form is more popular as a tool for personal gratification around here.

What I don't understand is why evolution would self-select for prettier women, but not prettier men. A man who is ugly is not going to get any play or opportunity to pass his ugly genes to the next generation. Right? So then men should be becoming more attractive.

The only reason I can think is that women are being honest when they say, "We don't care what the guy looks like."

What you are noticing is the fact that men are "attractive" to women for different reasons than women are attractive to men.

Warning: Sweeping Generalisation Approaching: Women aren't in it for looks beyond prehaps looks which show good general health. They are interested in the appearance of success and maybe personality traits which suggest the man might be successful such as humour (shows intelligence, social skills) assertiveness (shows leadship, possibily shows the ability to come up with new ideas although I think middle management is filled with prove this isn't always the case).

As a male, let me just say that it is sometimes good to be in the minority. The downside is that unless you are a dirty old man, there is no way to take advantage of the beautification of the female portion of the human race.

I call bullshit. When's is the last time you knew an attractive woman have 2+ kids. Now go check the children/woman in a so called "lesser civilized" people (rednecks, hillbillies, etc.) and rethink your statements there.

It is not only attractive women. What you are saying here is actually known as a social disease. Urban centers, overpopulation etc will have the effect of making woman want to have less kids. If you get those same woman and leave them on less populated places for a few years (6+), they will start wanting to have kids again.

As a father, I can say this doesn't happen only to women. Having a child will actually completes you and make you happy. It is natural for men and women to want to have kids. All the other "career" bullshit (given as a reason for men/women not having kids) is a symptom of a social disease.

Hey, whatever floats your boat man...I've spent my entire life trying my BEST to avoid having the little 'milstones' around my neck. That's what contraception is for (and abortion if those still fail).

I'm glad people like having kids, but, it just isn't right to say it "completes" you. I've never wanted any, and I feel very complete! I'm not tied down to kids and a wife, I can date as I please, trade to a new 'model' of woman when I feel like it, and I don't have to worry about what I spend my finances on, because little Suzy needs braces. I can come and go as I please, travel, experience life and all it has to offer.

I don't look down on your for your choices, but, to say one must have that 'traditional' home with wife and kids to be a complete person is just plain nonsense. Different strokes for different folks...

You experience all life has to offer? Really? You're experiencing a very limited subset of what life has to offer. Different strokes indeed, but don't delude yourself. You've traded one set of experiences for another.